siveness of the colonial régime, he had imbibed ideas wholly antagonistic to the great majority, by which and for which the independence had been achieved. And travel only tended to confirm the ancestral predilection for the old-world glories of Spain. He refused to court the populace, holding with haughty assumption of superiority to the path marked out by his prejudices. This tone pervaded also his transactions in general, wherein he acted with an unimpeachable integrity that scorned to take advantage of his official opportunities, and found support in a simple, unostentatious life, and an unobtrusive piety. Yet beneath this lofty rectitude lurked a cold reserve that repelled friendship, and a diplomatic calculation that did not scruple at any means for the accomplishment of a seemingly good partisan object. His mind and prominent traits stand reflected in his writings, with their depth of thought, their clear and unaffected style, and with their lurking satire and marked party bias.[1] Through him flowed both good and evil for Mexico; yet in all he undoubtedly aimed with true conviction for the best, and to him this centred in an autocratic government, which, with the aid of the educated and wealthy classes, including the clergy, should hold the masses in tutelage. His faults were rather of his race and class than of himself, and his countrymen can afford to forget them in admiring him as the foremost patron in his time of their arts and industries, as a distinguished historian, and as one of their greatest statesmen.[2]
His death, which occurred on June 2, 1853, while he was still unfolding his plans for reconstructing the government, proved a serious blow to his party; for
- ↑ An account of his literary work and life has been given at the close of vol. iv., Hist. Mex., 821-4, this series.
- ↑ He figured even for a brief term in 1829 as associate ruler with Velez and Quintanar, and continued with the incoming president, Bustamante, as premier. His adherents praise him further as the creator of national industries, 'el ornamento de su pais.' Alaman, Apuntes, 56. Rivera again abuses him as 'desprovisto de sentimientos patrios,' Gob. de Méx., ii. 146; while Arróniz, Biog. Mej., assumes a moderate impartiality. Perez, Dicc., i. 200-3.
